The North Bay is home to many smaller, lesser-known organizations doing yeoman’s work to make our communities better places to live. NorthBay biz profiles three that are making a difference even though they’re flying (for the most part) under the radar.
Helen Keller once remarked that the world is moved “not only by the mighty shoves of the heroes, but also by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker.” And while the North Bay is home to many large nonprofits with high profiles, there are many smaller, lesser-known organizations doing yeoman’s work to make our communities better places to live. NorthBay biz has selected three small organizations—one each from Napa, Sonoma and Marin counties—that are making a difference even though they’re flying (for the most part) under the radar. Their stories follow.
Ambassadors of Hope and Opportunity
Five years ago, Zara Babitzke, MA, founded Ambassadors of Hope and Opportunity to provide a safety net for Marin County youth between the ages of 16 and 25 who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. AHO offers stable housing, guidance and community connections for young adults who “are not mentally ill, not on drugs, incarcerated or in the foster system,” but who, without help, might fall through the cracks in what she describes as a “critical gap” in the system that ignores young people with no family or resources.
And Babitzke should know, because she’s been there.
“I came from a family like many of these youth: I had abusive and neglecting parents who weren’t there for support or guidance,” she explains. “I excelled in school, but no one came to my high school graduation to cheer me on. I graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pittsburgh (with a bachelor’s degree in education) and earned a master’s degree, but those essential, critical people who are supposed to be there for you as you’re growing weren’t there for me. So I’ve lived a lot of what these young people are living today, in a world that’s much harder for them than it was for me.”
Babitzke got a first-hand look at how the system sometimes doesn’t work when her younger sister, a single mother with children aged 10 and 12, had brain surgery and became incapacitated. As her only family, Babitzke became her sister’s conservator. “I really started Ambassadors back then,” she says. “I built a network to support my niece and nephew and saw with my sister that the system would have discarded her if a family member or advocate hadn’t been there to fight on her behalf. They said there was no way she’d be capable of functioning as a parent again and, since there was no hope, they wouldn’t provide any support. From that moment, my life changed—that’s what got me into social service. I saw how easy it was to discard people who don’t have support. This is how I feel about the young people we’re helping.”
In 2003, Babitzke was hired by Sunny Hills Children’s Garden in Marin (now Sunny Hills Services) to develop the first program in Marin County for young people aging out of residential placement facilities; it was also the first program in the county to provide support services to youth after age 18. She spearheaded the project and worked closely with the youth for two years until lack of funding caused the program to close. “The young people I was working with were just beginning to trust again, something that’s a huge piece of any good outcome. I just couldn’t be the next person in their life to abandon them, so I founded Ambassadors. It was a calling for me. My entire life, in many different ways, had been leading up to this—not that I knew it,” she says.
Babitzke started AHO with no seed money or startup capital. “I used my own funds. It was just the right thing to do. What was happening was wrong. In all my years in social service, I saw no one stepping up. I just had to do what I did,” she says.
Over the past five years, AHO has served more than 800 young adults in Marin with the help of 25 Alliance for Youth community partners that provide housing, employment, scholarships, dental care, medical care, mentoring and a plethora of other services.
“We provide comprehensive resources any young person might need that are typically provided through parental assistance,” she explains.
And it does “take a village”: RotaCare Free Clinic of San Rafael provides free medical services; Awakened Wisdom Experiences offers pro bono life coach training for AHO life coaches; Marin Career & Jobs offers job searching and retention skills, résumé writing and connections to employers; the College of Marin Foundation works to get scholarships, emergency funding, bus fares, book fees and much more; Image for Success puts together a wardrobe, including shoes, underwear and accessories, for job interviews; Legal Aid of Marin provides legal services, and so on.
One major resource for providing assistance comes from those who’ve been served themselves. A little over two years ago, AHO youth decided to form a Youth Task Force Team, comprised of individuals who want to give back for the help they’ve received from the organization and to engage their peers to work with them on youth-driven projects. “They come together weekly to create projects that can foster awareness and bring funding to Ambassadors,” she says. The task force recently raised $11,225 for AHO’s fifth anniversary by meeting weekly (for six months) to produce a youth concert fund-raiser; it also generated $17,325 in pro bono products and services for the event.
AHO has its champions in both the media and the business communities, including KGO-TV anchor Cheryl Jennings, actor Peter Coyote (who narrated the AHO documentary, Youth Homelessness: A Growing Trend, which aired on PBS twice) and the realtors in the Mill Valley office of Frank Howard Allen Realtors, who have the option to pledge a percentage of their commissions to AHO.
Like virtually all small (and large) nonprofits, funding is AHO’s biggest challenge. The organization is currently working on building a coalition of faith-based organizations that will focus their donation dollars on the AHO Safe Haven emergency housing and Drop-in Center, the only such center in the county. AHO is also bringing together a council of investors that will commit to provide financial resources on a multi-year basis so AHO can continue its work. To date, there have been a handful of meetings of interested investors with a goal of $30,000 in annual funding.
“Because we’re still grassroots and a small nonprofit, all our monies come from individuals, businesses, faith communities or small foundations,” Babitzke says. “We need to expand the circle of funding.”
On that note, AHO received a $20,000 donation ($15,000 for a Challenge Grant) from the Donald O. and Ronald R. Collins Fund of the Marin Community Foundation in November, which it needs to match by January 31 to receive. The fund is meant to generate matching donations for operating support for AHO’s Safe Haven Drop-in Center. Please visit the AHO website for more information.
The Ceres Community Project
Cathryn Couch has always been more inclined to say “yes” than “no” when the universe comes calling. And that’s a very good thing.
Couch is the founder and executive director of a fledgling Sebastopol nonprofit called The Ceres Community Project, which teaches teens how to cook and provides free, healthy, organic meals and nutritional education to nearly 150 Sonoma County families touched by cancer and other life-threatening illnesses.
After earning her MBA from the University of Michigan—followed by a stint as a marketing and strategic planning manager for a Southern California company—Couch moved to Marin and became director of communications for The Hunger Project U.S., a global organization that educates people about the causes of and solutions to hunger. She also honed her skills as a chef, and when she moved to Sonoma County in 1991, she started a vegetarian organic home delivery service (delivering her meals to about 80 families in Marin and Sonoma counties each week). After 10 years, she got out of the business and started working as a part-time chef.
“In 2006, at the beginning of the summer, a friend of mine called. She wanted to find a job for her daughter and she also wanted her to learn to cook, so she wanted me to hire her. I wasn’t in a position to hire anyone, but my friend was insistent and suggested we cook meals for the homeless shelter—and she volunteered to pay for the food,” Couch explains. “As soon as she made that suggestion, I thought about a friend who was involved with the local cancer support community, so I called her.” The friend confirmed there were families who needed help, so Couch agreed to teach the 17-year-old how to cook, and the two of them prepared meals for three local families once a week for about seven weeks.
After a few weeks, Couch says she “woke up with a vision of a nonprofit that would give kids needed experience in the kitchen,” while simultaneously providing help to families touched by serious illnesses. In March 2007, The Ceres Community Project, named for Ceres, the pre-Roman goddess of agriculture, was launched in the kitchen of the Community Church of Sebastopol. Its funding source was a $5,000 line of credit from Andy’s Produce in Sebastopol and a $7,500 grant from To Celebrate Life Breast Cancer Foundation in Marin.
Initially, there were five teens, and the group cooked for four families each week. By the end of 2007, 30 teens had been involved in preparing 4,500 meals for 28 families. Fast forward to the end of 2010: in three years, more than 69,000 meals had been served to more than 300 families and, “we’re literally overrun with kids who want to be in our kitchen,” Couch says.
The young chefs-in-training, from 25 different schools throughout the county, cook three afternoons a week. The program is so popular, Couch says, they have to schedule many of the teens to shifts every other week, because they don’t have enough room in the kitchen to accommodate all the volunteers.
That’s all about to change, however. The city of Sebastopol, upon learning more about the project, passed a resolution to lease—at no cost—city-owned space at 7351 Bodega Avenue on the Ives Park parcel. “They’re also giving us two five-year options to renew with no rent,” Couch explains, “and will put $45,000 into the remodel.” She notes it will be a win-win situation. The Ceres Community Project will get the expanded space it needs and the city “will end up with a much more beautiful, usable facility, which we’ll make available for the city and other nonprofits to use at no charge,” Couch says.
The Ceres Community Project expects to move into the facility by the middle of 2011. The group is working with Community Builders Group, a nonprofit started by John Rechin, one of the owners of Total Concepts in Santa Rosa. Community Builders Group works on building projects for nonprofit organizations and individuals in need, using its construction community contacts to get contractors and suppliers to donate, on average, 50 percent of the goods and labor needed for each construction project it undertakes. Myers Restaurant Supply, through Bob Mathis, is providing kitchen design expertise and is working with the county health department on all permits and approvals at a very reduced rate.
As The Ceres Community Project expands, so does its outreach. In 2009, Ceres launched an educational program to complement its food delivery service.
“Many of our clients, after being with us six to eight months and eating solely organic, whole grain foods with no refined sugars, find that they feel the difference the food is making. Then they get to a point, health-wise, where they don’t really need us anymore, but they don’t know how to cook in this manner,” Couch says. “So JoEllen DeNicola, our nutrition director, developed a 16-hour healing foods cooking course that we offer on a sliding scale donation basis. It’s designed for people recovering from illness. And we’ve also started a free community lecture series at the Center for Spiritual Learning in Santa Rosa.”
Despite the recession, which has dramatically impacted donations to nonprofits, The Ceres Community Project has been fortunate to see a steady stream of cash and in-kind giving. Couch counts on more than 1,000 donors with annual individual gifts between $25 and $50,000 per year. “They’re passionate and dedicated donors. We’ve managed to generate enthusiasm and excitement that pulls people in. But as we get bigger and more established, it will become harder. My goal is to get the organization to be sustainable for the long term without me, and I want to develop income streams that can grow with the organization,” Couch explains.
It’s also no fluke that the name of the organization includes the word “community.”
“The more the community is involved, the more they take ownership,” Couch says. “We have more than 30 in-kind donors [Oliver’s Market, for example, gives a 50 percent discount on all the meat and seafood that’s purchased]. For us, it’s about how many people we can get involved. We want them to feel they helped make it happen, because they did.”
Arts Council Napa Valley
Unlike the two upstarts profiled here, Arts Council Napa Valley (ACNV) has been around for 30 years, pulling strings behind the scenes to put Napa Valley on the cultural map.
Founded initially to support visual artists and art education programs in the schools, the organization broadened its mission after Napa completed a cultural plan, published in 2008.
Executive Director Kristina Young, who’s been with the organization in various roles for the last 11 years, says the cultural plan, put together by ACNV with support from the Napa Valley Community Foundation, the Hewlett Foundation and the county of Napa, has served as ACNV’s “mandate from the community” and, as a result, instead of focusing just on the visual arts and school children, the group now “supports all art forms and all audiences.
“The Cultural Plan process started in 2005 after we lost 12 arts organizations in the span of one year,” Young says. “Mayor Ed Henderson of Napa brought together arts leaders to talk about what to do. The group discussed ways to work together instead of competing and agreed this would be the only way the arts sector would survive—and this was long before the economy went down.”
Over 18 months, through many town meetings across the county and after interviews with artists, leaders of arts organizations and owners of various venues, “there was a clear map of what needed to be done,” Young continues.
“We learned that 40 percent of our audience wasn’t local—they were visiting. And to fill all our venues, one in 35 local residents would have to go to an arts event every night. It became obvious that we needed to look to our visitors to augment local audiences,” she explains. Nowadays, Arts Council Napa Valley works hand-in-hand with the Napa Valley Destination Council to promote arts events and find ways to woo what Young refers to as “cultural tourists,” especially during the winter off-season.
Arts Council Napa Valley has no venue, only a small office in downtown Napa, where Young and three other staffers work nonstop to support the arts community. “We’re creating a single marketing voice for the arts in Napa Valley by getting everyone to work together to share resources and a common message. It’s made us much stronger than when all the various groups were promoting individual messages,” she says.
The organization works directly with artists, galleries, theaters, educators and arts organizations to create “something for everyone, whether they be kids, middle aged or elderly,” Young says. Last fall, ACNV organized the first Napa Valley ARTS Celebration, a month-long salute to all the arts in the valley, which featured 117 events from 67 presenters.
To make sure there was an audience for the brand new event, ACNV scheduled it from mid-October through mid-November, to take advantage of the high tourist traffic at the end of harvest in October and then support the hospitality industry. “October is National Arts Month, but it’s not hard to sell the Napa Valley in October, so we decided to have the event two weeks in October and two weeks in November to get people here in the shoulder season,” Young explains.
While its focus has been broadened from its initial charter, the group has maintained its very popular arts education program with the schools in the valley. Currently, several Napa Valley schools are supported by ACNV, which hires teaching artists who then go into the classrooms to nurture students’ creative thinking and artistic expression.
The group is also directly involved in arts advocacy. “We helped pass a public art ordinance in the city of Napa as a way to demonstrate what public art is,” Young says. “The people in the community help decide what they want to see on their streets—we don’t believe in imposing art on the community. Through our new partnership with the city of Napa, we created the Napa ART Walk. In this program, new sculptural works come in every summer, and it gives people another reason to come downtown as we work to revitalize the area.”
ACNV’s budget is funded by the county hotel tax, city budgets and the state arts council, as well as by local foundations and individual donors. The recent economic downturn, which impacted the hospitality industry and cut hotel tax revenues, pushed the council to “make changes,” Young says. “We rely on tourists, but we’ve had to find more ways to invite our locals in to support our venues and artists.” The group has also had to look for funding from new sources, although Young says many of their supporters made sure to keep contributions steady during the economic slide. “The Napa Valley Community Foundation, in particular, has been incredibly supportive and generous,” she says.
When asked what the organization’s biggest challenge is, Young admits that funding is an easy answer, but not the real issue: instead, it’s visibility.
“We’re not always visible to the audience, because we’re in a support role. So it’s important that we promote our value to the community and get people to understand what we do, how we do it and why it’s important. Once people understand that, the funding will naturally follow,” she says.
While the small nonprofits NorthBay biz has profiled here are diverse in their objectives and serve dramatically different populations, one theme runs true. They’re led by selfless people with vision, passion and a drive to succeed despite obstacles that might be thrown in their path. And they love what they do—living proof that Theodore Roosevelt was right when he said, “Far and away the best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.”
